TitleNews Online Archive

TitleNews Online Archive

Mortgage Application Volume Down 3 Percent at Start of New Year

January 12, 2005

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending January 7. The Market Composite Index - a measure of mortgage loan application volume - was 587.8, a decrease of 3.0 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 605.7 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index increased 41.6 percent compared with last week but was down 17.4 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.

The MBA seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased by 5.8 percent to 393.1 from 417.3 the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Refinance Index increased by 1.1 percent to 1720.5 from 1701.3 one week earlier.

Other seasonally adjusted index activity included the Conventional Index, which decreased 2.4 percent to 876.8 from 898.4 the previous week. The Government Index decreased 10.1 percent to 105.5 from 117.3 the previous week.

The refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 49.0 percent of total applications from 48.0 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity increased to 32.7 percent from 32.6 percent of total applications.

The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 5.70 percent from 5.67 percent one week earlier, with points decreasing to 1.32 from 1.35 the previous week (including the origination fee) for 80 percent loan-to-value (LTV) ratio loans.

The average contract interest rate for 15-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 5.17 percent from 5.12 percent one week earlier, with points increasing to 1.31 from 1.25 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs decreased to 4.16 percent from 4.17 percent one week earlier, with points decreasing to 0.97 from 0.98 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.